Technology was the driver, Obama campaign manager

He’s credited as the mastermind of the most successful U.S. presidential campaign in recent history.

David Plouffe, who was reportedly in charge of the Obama campaign’s moving parts – media, staff, fundraising and travel – is not part of the presidential transition team, nor is he expected to join the incoming administration.

Plouffe laid out some of the campaign successes during Tuesday’s speech that at times seemed aimed almost entirely at political junkies. He credited that success to technology and the grassroots nature of the campaign.

“There was a freshness to our message and we thought we were using technology well,” he said of the hundreds of millions of dollars raised on the Internet. “Technology was the driver for us in fundraising and delivering our message.”

The campaign team invested a lot of time in making sure its message was clear and communicated directly to supporters. More than 13 million names were on their email distribution list.

The idea was to have supporters talk to their loved ones and neighbours about the campaign, which Plouffe believed would be a more powerful way to spread the word than television ads and newspaper articles.

Plouffe, who did not take questions from the media and reportedly forbade audio and video recordings of his Toronto speech.